


Fallin'

by BuckytheDucky



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: M/M, Pining, Tony and Steve are idiots, friendship to relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-09
Updated: 2018-05-09
Packaged: 2019-05-04 11:48:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14592378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BuckytheDucky/pseuds/BuckytheDucky
Summary: Sam and Rhodey are done with the fact that their best friends are so stubborn, oblivious, clueless, and hopeless. They've tried everything to get Steve and Tony to admit their feelings for the other, but - short of locking them in a room together and throwing away the key - there isn't much they can do. So they decide to just drink away their annoyance at their friends, every Friday night, and a friendship is born.The problem is, things are rarely that uncomplicated.





	Fallin'

Sam drains the last swallow from his beer and signals to the bartender for another. The bottle lands on the bar with a solid thud, and Sam reaches for it, but his fingers close on empty air. Sighing, he lets his hand drop and turns to face the person who stole his drink.  
  
“Oh.” Sam clears his throat, smiles as the anger dies in his throat. “Colonel Rhodes.”  
  
“Please, I think you’ve earned the right to call me James.”  
  
Another beer is placed in front of Sam, and this time, he gets to keep it. The two men drink in silence for a couple of minutes. The low buzz of conversation mixes with the slight static of the jukebox as it plays some country ballad; a few couples dance close together in the open area by the stage. There’s nothing special about this bar ー it’s much like any other dive bar all over the world ー but that’s what makes it special to Sam. It’s the reason why he comes here so often, at least once a week, to enjoy the anonymity and the sparse conversations that occur with the other drunk patrons, this little slice of reality away from being a superhero and a therapist and the best friend of one of the _the most_ oblivious idiots in this world.  
  
“So what brings you here?” he asks, draining half his beer in one long swallow; thinking of Steve always fills him with the urge to get as drunk as possible as fast as possible.  
  
James laughs. “That sounds a lot like a poorly-planned pick-up line, Wilson.”  
  
“Yeah, well, it isn’t, promise.”  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“Yeah. If I was using a pick-up line, you’d know it. It’d be a helluva lot smoother, and we’d already be outta here.”  
  
James taps the neck of Sam’s beer with his own, a wide smile splitting his face. Another few moments pass in relative quiet; Sam is aware that James hasn’t answered his question, but he isn’t about to push. Things have been tense around the Tower, ever since SHIELD fell and Barnes came in from his one-man mission to eliminate HYDRA from the face of the Earth. Steve hadn’t asked for Tony’s permission before sneaking Barnes into the Tower, stopped only by the fact that JARVIS locked the elevator down and refused to let it move; for five hours, Steve and Tony had fought, argued, shouted at each other over the intercom. Tony had finally relented with the condition that Barnes stay away from the workshop. And the range. An anywhere Tony might be. Thankfully, Barnes hadn’t argued, had complied, and Tony’s slowly allowed Barnes a little more freedom. He still isn’t allowed in the workshop or range, though, but Tony has stopped hightailing it from whatever room he’s in whenever Barnes enters.  
  
The worst part of all this is the fact that Tony and Steve won’t just talk to each other. Oh, Steve will bend Sam’s ear with nonstop chatter about Tony, and they’ll both send message to each other via JARVIS (and Sam really does not envy the AI for that particular task), but they refuse to stay in the same room as the other for more than five seconds unless absolutely necessary. Game and movie nights just aren’t the same now without Tony’s incessant analysing and criticising of whatever film is playing or Steve’s grumpy face when he loses yet again at Monopoly or Uno, games that he’s quite frankly terrible at even though they require strategy.  
  
But even though they aren’t communicating like grown-ass adults, there is literally no way that the looks they send each other’s turned backs go unnoticed. Sam has lost count of how many times he’s caught Steve’s lovesick, puppy-eyed looks of longing trained intently on Tony when he thinks he’s being sneaky only for the expression to change immediately to a blank stare at whatever is right in front of him as soon as Tony turns to face him. Sam’s told Steve, so many times, until he was blue in the face, to just _talk to Tony_ , get this whole thing figured out, but Steve’s far too stubborn and prideful to actually give in and do the right thing, which means Sam is left either finding a different way to get through to Steve or wiping his hands of the entire situation.  
  
“Our friends are idiots.”  
  
Sam snorts. “Ain’t that the truth.”  
  
“I’m so sick of the whole thing.” James finishes his beer; the bottle clinks hollowly when he sets it down on the bar. “Tony’s so caught up in Steve, it’s sickening. And annoying. I love him, he’s my best friend, but if I have to hear about Seve this, Steve that, why does he still hate me, haven’t I done enough to prove I’m sorry, one more time ー just once ー I may strangle him myself.”  
  
“Welcome to the club,” announces Sam as he claps James on the shoulder, squeezing affectionately. “Welcome to the damn club.”  
  
“What, the ‘My best friend’s in love with his superhero teammate but is an idiot and won’t pull his head out of his ass and just _tell_ said superhero teammate’ Club?”  
  
“Exactly. Wanna know how we celebrate new memories?’  
  
James eyes Sam then shrugs. “Getting drunk?’  
  
“So unbelievably drunk.”  


  


_______________

  


  
And so it goes. Sam continues to go to his favourite hole-in-the-wall dive every Friday night, and sometimes, James joins, shows up to drink the night away on the stool to Sam’s right. Most times, though, they can only text back and forth, Sam at the bar and James off wherever the Air Force needs him to be. They’d exchanged numbers at the end of that first night, both promising to not drink alone to forget the misery that is Steve and Tony’s obliviousness, even if they can’t be in the same place.  
  
It’s been nice having someone besides Steve to talk to over the last few months. Sure, Sam has other friends ー fellow coworkers at the VA, people he’s known since before and during his years in the military. But none of them can quite relate to having a second job as a costumed, winged superhero who was bullied into living in an enormous tower built by an eccentric billionaire genius and run by an artificial intelligence programme. James _can_ , for the most part; he hasn’t quite given in to Tony’s demands of moving in, but even James admits it’s really only a matter of time.  
  
**From: James** _Haven’t gotten started yet, have you?_  
  
**To: James** _I absolutely have_  
  
**From: James** _Without me?_  
**From: James** _You’re cold, man_  
  
**To: James** _Shouldn’t be late. Maybe this will teach you to be on time from now on :p_  
  
**From: James** _COLD_  
  
Sam laughs when he gets another text message, this one just an emoji of a hand flipping him off. He holds up two fingers, gestures at his bottle, and the bartender nods and uncaps a couple of beers, sliding them down the bar. A warm hand wraps around the back of Sam’s neck, shakes him gently, and someone takes a seat next to him. Sam doesn’t even have to look to know that it’s James. With a grin, he nudges a bottle toward the other man.  
  
“Steve?”  
  
“Steve.” Sam sighs. “Seriously, how many times can a man be told he’s being dumb and needs to admit his feelings for the man he loves before he actually does it?”  
  
“Last count, I’d told Tony the same thing over a hundred times. Then I started making JARVIS keep count. My poor brain needed a break.”  
  
“I hear that.”  
  
This is comfortable. It’s _nice_. Sam knows this entire thing, whatever it is, isn’t much; after all, it only started because of Tony and Steve, but still… It’s nice enough that Sam doesn’t want to change a thing. James is a solid presence by his side as they drink cheap beer and listen to the jukebox warbling Loretta Lynn’s “These Boots Are Made for Walking” for the third time in a row.  


  


_______________

  


  
It really shouldn’t be a surprise that it happens eventually: H’s walking down the street, coming home from a long day at the VA, and he snaps a picture of the pop-up menu board outside a hipster cafe that proudly proclaims they serve “100% organic cucumber-wheatgrass-kale smoothies,” sending the image off to James with a “ _WTF is this shit??? I eat healthy but hell no._ ” It’s the first time either of them has started a conversation via text about anything other than drinking at the bar and commiserating over their dumb friends. It is also the first time since he was a teenager that Sam gives in to the demand he try something that sounds so disgusting, his stomach hurts at just the thought, purely because someone told him to. He sends James pictures of the counter inside the cafe, the cup once the smoothie is made, him taking the first sip of the radioactive-green drink, and another of his face as he spits the concoction into a nearby trashcan, face twisted in repulsion. He drops the cup into the same garbage bin then heads further down the block to the Starbucks that sits on the corner. It requires half of his iced caramel latte to get the taste out of his mouth, and by that time, James has replied back with three incomprehensible messages and a selfie of him laughing so hard, tears are streaming down his cheeks. Sam chuckles, putting his phone in his pocket as he crosses the street.  
  
That sparks a steady stream of correspondence between the two of them. Sam’s inbox rapidly fills with text messages about anything James seems interesting enough to share, the occasional selfie (a few of which are taken from inside War Machine’s helmet; one in particular is of James rolling his eyes ー he later told Sam that he'd been flying back to base when Tony called, complaining about his lack of a love life with Steve). _Can't we just lock them in a room until they either kill each other or work this out?_ , he'd asked, and Sam had to regretfully veto that plan. Though it would take less work on their part, it also would have left them down two members of the team: If they killed each other, they'd be too dead to be much help to the team, and if they figured out what the hell they're doing, they'd be too busy and preoccupied in bed to be much help to the team. Sam, in turn, sends James texts about whatever is happening in his life ー complaints about the VA and government red-tape, complains about Clint eating the last of the Toaster Strudels Sam eats when he's running late to work, musings about where Natasha disappears to every weekend if she isn't needed by the remnants of SHIELD.  
  
When Sam wakes one morning, ten months after that first night at the bar, he's in too much pain to think clearly. His entire body aches, and his toe itches rather badly. A steady beeping fills his ears; the sound is annoyingly familiar. He groans, his eyes fluttering open before slamming shut at the bright light that sends a stabbing sensation through his head.  
  
“Hey, hey, it's okay, just a second.”  
  
A cool hand rests over his eyes, and Sam sighs blissfully at the sudden dark. When the hand moves, Sam braces himself for more agony, but nothing comes; even through his closed eyelids, he can tell that someone has dimmed the room lights. He waits another couple of seconds then slowly opens his eyes again. The room beyond is fuzzy, shadows on shadows, until he blinks once, twice, and a face swims into focus. There are tight lines around James's eyes, but he's smiling.  
  
“Welcome back, Wilson.”  
  
Sam grins, a weak tug of his lips, and he's falling asleep.  
  
James isn't there every time Sam floats back to consciousness. Sometimes, it's Steve, sometimes it's Clint, once it's even Barnes. Each time, Sam asks about James, and each time, he's told James is off sleeping or handling cleanup or talking Tony out of his workshop where he's been for over a week, ever since Sam fell out of the sky and through the roof of a warehouse. According to Natasha, and bless her for telling him the truth without sugar-coating it, the jetpack malfunctioned, and the wings were shredded in his descent by shrapnel from an explosion caused by the hail of bullets hitting a gas tank. It was James who first noticed that Sam was falling, spinning out of control, but they were all too far away to catch him before he crashed to the earth. Thankfully, some kid in a terrible red-and-blue costume had managed to use some kind of netting to keep Sam from hitting the ground; the kid was gone by the time Tony got there, a hastily-scribbled note stuck to the net: _You're welcome. ー Your friendly neighbourhood Spiderman._  
  
“Were you scared?” he whispers, morphine loosening his tongue.  
  
James sighs, though he stays reclined with his eyes closed in a chair one of the nurses brought in. “Terrified. You weren't responding to our calls, and you'd fallen nearly sixty feet. None of us knew what was going on.”  
  
This is the first time since Lucy Callahan, at fourteen, that Sam feels that clench in his chest; he reaches out slowly, grasps James's hand in his, and squeezes. James clings back just as tight.  


  


_______________

  


  
Thing change, but not in the way Sam's expected them to. James still isn't around all the time, their conversations rarely go to deeper topics, and they still spend every Friday night complaining about their friends. But there's more casual touching, a clap of a hand to a shoulder, a playful shove, a flick of a finger against an ear when a particularly bad joke is made. And Sam can't shake the feelings he gets when James is around. He likes it, likes feeling something even if it isn't reciprocated. He knows there's an age difference ー almost eleven years between them ー but he's never put much stock in the correlation between age and experience; he was in the military, he knows men as young as eighteen who've seen far more than men twice or even three times their age. James is… James is to Sam what Steve said he was looking for ー someone with shared life experience. Sam wants that. He wants _James_.  
  
“Keep starin’, and he's gonna end up noticin’.”  
  
Sam scowls at Barnes, taking a sip of his drink and reluctantly dragging his gaze away from where James is laughing with Tony and Bruce across the terrace. “Shut up.”  
  
“Didn't realise your crush on Rhodes took away your comeback skills “ Barnes hums thoughtfully. “I'll have to keep that in mind.”  
  
“Again, man, shut the hell up.”  
  
“So does he know?”  
  
“Know what?”  
  
“Know that you want to _hug_ him, you want to _love_ him, you want to _smooch_ him,” Barnes says in a sing-song voice, cackling at the end.  
  
“Who in their right mind would let you watch 'Miss Congeniality’?”  
  
“Natasha. So… does he? You haven't told him, have you? Well, I guess it makes sense. You didn’t do anything about your crush on Natasha so ー”  
  
“I didn't have a crush on Nat. I found her attractive, we flirted, that was it.”  
  
“Ah, but you ain't denyin’ your crush on Rhodes?”  
  
“It's not a crush.”  
  
“Uh-huh. So why don't you tell him about it?”  
  
“Nothing to tell,” Sam grits out; he looks around at the people gathered, but nobody is coming to his rescue. Even Steve is focusing more on watching Tony closely, his body a taut line of tension, jealousy coming off him in waves.  
  
“You totally have a crush on him. Just tell him, ‘s’all I’m sayin’. Don’t be like Steve and Stark.”  
  
And that… That’s too much. Sam glares at Barnes sets his cup on the table, and crosses the terrace. He can hear someone ー Natasha, maybe, or Hill ー say his name as he passes their table butt he pays them no mind. The sun overhead is hot, but the blood in his veins is hotter. Tony stops speaking once Sam joins them, and James barely gets the chance to cock his head and give Sam a questioning look before Sam’s kissing him. Right there, in front of their friends, their _family_ , Sam is cradling James’s face in his hands, tilting his head just enough that their lips fit together more perfectly, kissing James with everything he has. One rapid flutter of a heartbeat, then two, and Sam sighs with relief against James’s lips when the other man kisses back. A low groan filters out of him when he feels two strong arms wrap around his waist, pull him closers; James deepens the kiss, lips parting beneath Sam’s, and this feels better than flying. This has the freedom that the wings provide, but also comfort, security, _safety_ from falling to a tragic end.  
  
Behind him, Barnes makes a gagging noise and shouts “Oh, my God, Wilson, I only said to _tell_ him, I didn’t wanna see this!”  
  
Sam lets go of James’s cheek with one hand, flipping Barnes off over his shoulder without breaking the kiss. There’s cheering, laughter, coming from all around, and a fork clinks against glass, the _tink-tink-tink_ melodic yet drowned out by the cacophony of voices.  
  
“Hey, people, I’m _speaking_ here!”Tony calls out. “C’mon, guys, I know you usually ignore me anyway, but this is just cruel! Cap ー”  
  
Sam tunes him out to continue enjoying the softness of James’s lips, the slick, slow slide of their tongues, the taste of lemonade and cake and whisky. Unfortunately, James pulls away laughing, and he presses a quick kiss to Sam’s lips before facing Tony. James’s arm stays around Sam’s waist, a solid line of warmth that Sam leans into. He can feel the goofy, dazed smile that’s taken over, but he doesn’t care. It’s been almost eighteen months in the making, and he’s going to hold on to this happiness as long as he can.  
  
Tony raises his tumbler of scotch into the air. “As I was saying before Clint was an asshole, I’ve been telling Rhodey for, oh, a few years now to find someone, settle down, and be happy. A year and a half ago, it changed from ‘find someone’ to ‘for God's, sake, Sourpatch, just jump Wilson’s bones already’. And, well, they’re both surprisingly awesome people, so that last part remains the same: ‘Be happy.’  
  
“To Rhodey and Sam!”  
  
“To us,” James whispers in Sam’s ear, and Sam, grinning, kisses him again.

**Author's Note:**

> So. I watched _Infinity War_ on Sunday and left the theatre with this ship firmly in mind. Thanks to [liv](why-is-hawkeye.tumblr.com) for letting me come into their inbox and flail about this fic idea. There will most likely be a second part to this fic, not gonna promise _when_ , though. 
> 
> Unbeta'd because I just wanted to post this.


End file.
